It was a normal day at Slowes. I was a cashier and was ringing up a fat, angry, man. I admit it. He was angry and he was fat. One thing you should learn about me is that I don’t mince words. I tell it like I see it. He was pissed because his wife wanted him to do a major renovation to his house and the cost was going up and up.

            “What do you mean it is $258 dollars and 95 cents? All I have here is 20 2 x 4 of wood, 5 packages of nails, 12 boards of Sheetrock 3 cans of paint and 2 roller brushes,” he said stunned.

            I replied, “The wood is 2 dollars each which brings the total to 40 dollars. The package of nails is $5.98 times 5 which equals $29.99 dollars. The Sheetrock is $8.99 times 12 equaling $107.00 dollars. The paint is $23.99 times 2 equaling $47.98 and the brushes cost $16.99 each equaling $33.98. The grand total is 258 dollars and 98 cents.”

            The guy looked at me in disbelief. It was as if he didn’t know what to believe, me or the calculations. He huffed and puffed and then placed 3, 100 dollar bills in my hand. As he did this I happened to notice he had at least 15 $100 dollar bills in his wallet. I thought to myself, “Yeah, right this guy is poor. Obviously, he has the money. He just doesn’t want to spend it. This does not make him a bad man just a very cautious shopper.”

            He walked away in a huff and the next customer came up. The day dragged on one after the other there was some shopper with some kind of game they wanted to play. Here was one who gave me 40 dollars, for a 60 dollar purchase, thinking I wouldn’t realize it.

            Another one tried to take merchandise he just placed on the table and place it back in his wagon without me scanning it asking me, “Did you get this?” He was hoping, that while I was busy scanning one thing, I wouldn’t notice this exchange. Believe it or not I used to fall for this. Now I am more aware of my environment and say, “No.” and scanned the item.